Rock´n´Roll in classic times - the dance, the music

We are familiar with the modern Rock'n'Roll as a child of the Europe for 25 years. You can recognize it from the basics which contains kicks and not necessarily but perhaps also from the rock'n'roll music. In the legendary 50's Rock'n'Roll as a dance and music were inseparable. That time can seem like the classical time of Rock'n'Roll for us.

Once a pioneer, today a veteran: Horst Todt

The thing that makes life worth living for Horst Todt is oldie's Rock'n'Roll and Boogie-Woogie. He is the honorary president of DRBV (Deutscher Rock´n'Roll- und Boogie-Woogie-Verband e.V.) and he must be our narrator when it comes to the early years. His knowledge of american music and dancing is exemplary on this particular time and on what happened to him. Everything began in the rough times...

Not an unpolitical history or: Two sides of one society

1942. Under the government of the national socialists jazz and different dance styles to it like Swing, Jitterbug and Boogie were forbidden. If you comment in malicious way: the clips from the american films with music and dance scenes should have made the Germans go against the so-called "nigger music"; In the minds of the government it was a complete mistake to show these clips, at least when it came to one part of the younger public and Horst Todt. USA electrified the teenagers when they were introduced to Jitterbug and Goodman music. He and his friends found out everything they could about swing and boogie-woogie music from the old records (Schellackplatten).

The war showed yet another side of USA: the hunt for the American bombers. The damages, caused by the air warfare forced the government to make a decision against their own youngsters - the youngsters had to join the air force. Horst Todt was barely 16 years old when he became the gunman in a quarter artillery (vierlingsflak). After two bombings he got the iron cross. Anyway, the war with the powers of USA didn't diminish the skills of most of the youngsters in Germany, as they would soon show.

Dancing in the pre-Rock'n'Roll time

Soon after the end of the war the Americans aimed the rebuilding at "German Youth Activities Clubs." Here the youngsters could learn from the US-soldiers to dance to jazz bands, mostly from coloured soldiers. Horst Todt was happy to get this kind of education. They danced to dixieland music, boogie-woogie music and above all to swing music. They called it Jitterbug, later Boogie-Woogie without any stress of remembering the difference in the two words. Jitterbug and Boogie-Woogie developed in many places in the postwar Germany. People danced in different styles both regionally and individually as the original teachers in the US-clubs had danced according to their roots and regions. Distinctive is that Horst Todt and the couples in his show formation "Boogie-Hell-Dancers" had to fix first same kind of steps within the group. Cinemas and photos from the early 50's show that this group of Berlin's top couples had a bouncy basics, almost a jump without kicks (= einem gehüpften Grundschritt, gleichsam einem Sprungschritt ohne Kicks). 

The Rock'n'Roll stormed to Germany

And then USA sent rock'n'roll music to Germany, in 1956 to be precise, if one wants to follow the story from the accurate notes. "How rock'n'roll music came to Germany" was the title for the book review in "rock time" number 4/96. The new music that then came to shore became soon popular in places where there was a positive attitude towards the exciting, motivating, pulsating; mostly among teenagers and teens. It was loud music with obsine rhythm with extremely strong emphasis on the second and fourth beat of the bar. Certainly it is just this "big beat" element which with the other typical rock'n'roll elements made the impact. For the adults rock'n'roll remained remote. 

A dance born from the music

For one part of the youngsters rock'n'roll music went irresistibly to the bones. No dance lessons came over the ocean this time, possibly just some dance scenes on film. Horst Todt stated drastically: "Rock'n'Roll dancers got nothing." In many places there were always talented people, who danced what the rhythm gave them. "The dancers had simply the rhythm inside them", was the way one author described it. The music created spontaneously their way to dance. Through showing others, shows and imitating the steps and the figures that were found, the steps spread out as the dance to the rock'n'roll music. This was an amazing phenomenon which even today can be witnessed by those numerous people that where youngsters back then. From this beginning followed also the variety in teaching, which started quite independent of the individual abilities to dance. This classical Rock'n'Roll was free and unbound. This way one could come to the bouncy kick basics. As Horst Todt would say: "The kick basics gave Rock'n'Roll it's soul." The acrobatic figures were just a rare ornament for the average dancer of classical Rock'n'Roll. Acrobatics was more important for the show and couples of the national team, because through acrobatics you could make a special effect. 

The other dance relatives

Is there a line of development to Rock'n'Roll from for example Jitterbug or Boogie-Woogie? According to the historical facts which we just looked at, it is not likely. This conclusion must not stop groups from taking characteristics from dance music and different dances and to create new similar dances. Systematists count this old Rock'n'Roll among other dances like Blues, Lindy Hop, Swing, Jive, Jitterbug, Bebop and Boogie-Woogie to the group of Swing dances. 

In one case you must not count out the connection between Rock'n'Roll and those dances that existed before. The dance couples - like in Horst Todt's group - changed their dancing from Jitterbug (or Boogie-Woogie) to Rock'n'Roll. Those things that this kind of persons had found out before they used to the more emphasized rhythm through stronger movements; we can read about this and also hear it from contemporary persons.

Vinyl records and music boxes

The free, unforced way to dance to the rock'n'roll music became the typical way to dance Rock'n'Roll. Despite "big beat" and the dance craze - back then the music and the dance had a major influence, which depended also on a technical solution: the point of date of discovering how to make records of vinyl. The records and the music boxes at the dance places were necessary to expand the music and the dance. If the local host of the dance place didn't sometimes have a popular song at hand, it could happen that the dancers even brought their own equipments for the jukebox. 

After the rock'n'roll era

In the early 60's rock'n'roll music got out of the way of other pop music streams. It was unavoidable that also dancing of Rock'n'Roll diminished. But the classical Rock'n'Roll didn't die altogether in Germany. Once in the end of the 60's it really picked up but just for a short while. All the time in the background there were the real fans who danced the old Rock'n'Roll to the original music. For example in Berlin more and more places in the later 80's took Rock'n'Roll in. Especially persistent the old Rock'n'Roll lived on in Schaumburg near Hannover. There in 1978 a whole lot of ladies and gentlemen started together the Rock'n'Roll Club Schaumburg to be able to continue their love affair with the music and dance of their youth. And that is what they are still doing. Regularly also some younger people come there and they want to try the old style.

In the club evenings there is also Boogie-Woogie and classical Rock'n'Roll there. Also Boogie couples dance there at least for a title - for them the "big beat" isn't so fascinating. At this point the observer types state that Boogie-Woogie as a dance isn't the same as Rock'n'Roll and that you can't dance Boogie-Woogie to rock'n'roll music. It is possible that there isn't any other besides RRC Schaumburg to take such good care of the classical Rock'n'Roll. Their radiation reaches discos, members of the clubs of DRBV, allures newcomers and motivates training groups. So lively can the classical Rock'n'Roll be even today!
 

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